


the pros and cons of breathing

by noturno



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Small Town, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Band Break Up, Bickering, Falling In Love, Fleeting Relationship, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Injury Recovery, M/M, Meet-Ugly, Rockstar Huang Ren Jun, Slow Burn, Writer Mark Lee (NCT)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 04:54:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28950732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noturno/pseuds/noturno
Summary: “This is where all the poets come to die,” Mark tells him. “Not literally, of course. But I like to believe that, if there’s anywhere in the world where someone’s words are put to rest, it’s here.”In a spur of courage, Renjun asks him; “Is this why you’ve come here to hide?”Mark stays silent for a long while, fidgeting with the bottle of wine until he reaches for a corkscrew in his bag. “Maybe so,” he replies. “Isn’t it worth it?”
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Mark Lee
Comments: 13
Kudos: 48
Collections: Love Dream 2020





	the pros and cons of breathing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LivelyColorfulWorld](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LivelyColorfulWorld/gifts).



> hi, rose! i hope i made justice to your idea, and hope that you'll like this. and i heard that today (the 15th) is your birthday! idk if you're going to see this after i edited it, but happy birthday :^) 
> 
> at last, thank you so much to the dream exchange mods for bringing this fest together!

_Your life is happening now. You have to reach for what you love. You’re already doing that with your music. Keep doing it, on all fronts. Reach for what you love with abandon, with hope in your heart, with fragility, without knowing exactly what comes next. Reach and never, ever stop reaching._ (Heather Havrilesky, “How to Be a Person in the World”)

_TRACK 1: WINTER_

If Huang Renjun were to rank the most relevant events in the story of his life, it is certain that the time in which Donghyuck decided he was into poetry would be a solid number three.

Perhaps even two. Who knows. Most of the time, when Renjun thinks of this, he’s stoned, so forgive his lack of more critical thinking — the sole reason for it is because Donghyuck, his best friend, five feet something with the kitty heels on, has always been much bigger than himself. A true force to be reckoned with, he had spent long, long weeks with his nose buried in old books, lended to him by the guy he would be breaking up with soon, and he’d recite things to Renjun over breakfast. _“The first thing God made is love,”_ he recalls Donghyuck had said once. _“Then comes blood, and the thirst for blood.”_

 _“How charming,”_ Jaemin had replied. The tour bus shook over the cracks on the road and his coffee spilled over his pants like countless times before that, because Jaemin never learns. That’s the main thing about him, Renjun thinks. _“Fuck, Donghyuck, look what you made me do.”_

In classic Donghyuck fashion, he sneered: _“I cannot control the speed at which you ruin your clothes, love,”_ And then, in a whisper, added: _“But I’d be more than glad to help next time.”_

Well, Renjun’s memories are not that good. The more you try to recall something, the more your brain will shape that piece of truth into something more palatable, into something you’d like to hear rather than something you need to hear, to pet your ego, or to comfort you, even. It’s either that, or it’s just the pot that’s permanently damaged his brain cells, as Chenle would say. But anyway, Maybe Donghyuck and Jaemin weren’t screwing behind both of their boyfriends’ backs, but it made sense to Renjun to think that they were. When Jeno sat beside him on a leather couch after an award show, in some artist’s fancy home he’ll probably never visit again, still wearing his jacket custom made to match Renjun’s during the entire tour, and said _I’m quitting the band, I think the others are too_ , Renjun had tried to blame all of them for ruining what they had, regardless of his reasons being inventions of his mind or not.

He tried really hard to blame them. Sometimes he thinks he tried so hard that it stopped making sense, that it started looking like some petty, childish attempt to preserve himself. Fuck Jaemin and Donghyuck for not coming clean, fuck Jeno for leaving first, fuck Chenle for trying to stitch them back together when they didn’t want to, and fuck Jisung for not saying a word at all. Did they really, though? Did they all do that? Or did Renjun imagine all that, maybe _he_ was in the wrong instead.

So, yeah. Poetry. Donghyuck’s poetry, a few months before the end. The sole reason why this is a significant period in Renjun’s own personal history is because Donghyuck, drenched hair matted to his forehead and tears down his rosy cheeks, had stared at him in the outside hallway that lead to the cheap ass apartment Renjun still rented as a refuge, somewhere he could just go and sit and write and sing and, later on, hide, and said: _this is the way the world ends, Renjun. Not with a bang, but a whimper_.

Half a year later, or specifically five months, twenty seven days and a couple of hours later, Renjun curses under his breath as he opens the door of the car he rented earlier in the day, every hair in his body standing up with the cold outside, and looks down at the idiot, the moron—

“I have one think to ask of you,” the guy lying down on the slippery road says, holding onto his shoulder with a gloved hand. His glasses are askew, his hair is sticking up weirdly due to the weather, and all the contents of his bag are thrown to the wet ground. Renjun didn’t hit him, but it was only for a matter of seconds — he hit the brakes and watched, in slow motion, as the stranger’s bike slipped on the road. He lets out a soft whimper, and then looks up at Renjun with the biggest and angriest eyes he’s ever seen. “Are you even old enough to have a fucking driver’s license, asshole?”

“So, you ran a guy over?”

“I ran a guy over,” Renjun repeats over the phone, in a hushed whisper. An emergency room in a town this small has to be the weirdest place he’s been to — too tiny, too white, too empty. He had to leave. He locked himself in the telephone cabin right outside the hospital and rang the first number he could think of. “I mean, I didn’t. I startled him and he fell over with his bike — I wasn’t even in the wrong lane.”

“You failed your test a billion times, how would you even know the right lane?”

He ignores him. “How are _you_ doing, Jisung?”

The latter lets out a long “uuuuuuuhhhhhhh,” which probably means he’s spent the last months on Chenle’s couch, playing video games or rewatching The X-Files for the hundredth time. It’s not that he didn’t do those things while they were a thing, it’s just that he doesn’t have a reason to leave Chenle’s place now. “You know, the usual,” Jisung responds vaguely. “Can’t believe you’re going to jail for murder and we can’t even use that for clout. Imagine how many albums we could sell with this.”

“I am not going to jail,” Renjun replies exasperatedly. He thought about it, many times — that their old manager, Kun, would kill him if he ever heard of it. He’d kill Renjun for less noble motives, surely, given all the shit Renjun had put him through, six years on the road. But if Kun had seen it on the news, **FORMER ROCK LEGEND HUANG RENJUN JAILED FOR NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE** , he’d find a way to locate him and put him down himself. “He’s not even going to press charges.”

“Damn. Seems you got lucky with this one, Renjun.”

Jisung stays silent for a long while after that. Renjun does too, for he does not know what to say, and they listen to each other’s breathing for what feels like a lifetime.

They haven’t spoken to each other in a while, because Renjun hasn’t responded to his calls — one time, as Renjun was busy puking his guts out in the bathroom, he had overheard Jisung explaining to Jeno that, to him, Renjun was like a stray cat. One that comes and goes, that raids your trash at night and makes you furious, but that never stops showing up at your doorstep, fully knowing there will be food inside. And there will _always_ be food inside. He then walked into the bathroom and gave him a shower, drenching his own clothes in the cold water as he held Renjun up in his not-so-boyish-anymore arms. Later that night, he and Jisung had shared Donghyuck’s new expensive couch, and Renjun had pressed his face to Jisung’s uncomfortably bony shoulder and whispered _thank you, you’re an angel, thank you, you’re an angel, thank you…_ Anyways, every time he speaks to Jisung, he feels as if time hasn’t passed at all. As if he’s still seventeen and running away from home, as if Jisung is still the fifteen year old who would follow him anywhere, even to the end of the world.

“I—” Jisung breathes out. “I miss you.”

A beat of silence.

“I’m sorry,” he continues. “You just killed a guy. I know it’s not the most appropriate thing to say at the moment.”

“I didn’t kill anyone, for fuck’s sake,” Renjun replies. A nurse knocks on the glass window and he almost jumps out of his skin. “I have to go.”

He puts the phone back in its place without hearing Jisung’s goodbyes, and then steps out into the cold once more. There are things that are always better left unsaid. Goodbyes, for example. Renjun can’t stand them. “Hello, miss,” he says. “How is—”

“Your boyfriend is doing well,” she nods, motioning for the door that leads back into the hospital. “But, please, kindly follow me, sir. He cannot leave unaccompanied.”

“He’s not my—” Renjun sighs. She’s already turned her back on him.

The last time Renjun was inside a hospital, Jaemin had taken the stitches off his chest. He was happy, so happy — Renjun had always associated hospitals with sad, maybe even morbid things, but Jaemin was so happy. He was giddy with excitement and Renjun didn’t mind carrying instruments for him, or reminding him to take painkillers, or doing anything that was usually Jaemin’s job — he was never a caregiver, but for Jaemin, he could. He could, he could, he could.

Renjun rubs a hand against his face as he marches down the corridor. Maybe he should go a few more months without speaking to Jisung. Why is he even thinking of Jaemin now?

The nurse escorts him to room 023. Renjun doesn’t have time to thank her because she disappears in the corridor in the blink of an eye — he wonders how many people are hospitalized here right now. Probably less than the number of students in his class before he dropped out of school. He opens the door.

“These people think we are together,” says the guy sitting on the bed. Renjun meant to go through his documents before driving him to the hospital, but it seemed that his wallet had been lost in the fall, and he was too busy cursing Renjun’s family up to the fifth generation to tell him his name. “I don’t know how to break it to them that if my boyfriend broke my shoulder, he certainly wouldn’t be my boyfriend anymore.”

“Your shoulder is not broken,” Renjun replies as he closes the door behind himself. He had listened to the doctor. “It’s a… What’s your name again?”

The guy gapes at him. He looks sort of ridiculous — the nurse had given him a sling, and he’s still wearing that hospital gown that looks terrible on everyone, but has somehow managed to pull up his jeans, and tucked his hair inside the beanie again.

“Mark,” he says, somehow sounding incredule. “My name is Mark Lee.”

“It’s a sprain, _Mark Lee_ ,” Renjun continues. “You will survive.”

The other stays silent for a long moment, and then asks: “Do you have any idea of who I am?”

Renjun stares at him blankly. Mark stares back. “Should I?”

“No,” he replies promptly. “No, of course not.”

Mark slides off the bed, reaching for his bad on the cabinet near the window with his good hand — the doctors were upset that it took Renjun so long to get help, but Mark had forced him to recover every journal, every pencil case and every single sheet of paper that had been taken by the wind after he fell from his bike. Most of them were unsalvageable, wet and turning into a weird sort of paste in Renjun’s hand, but Mark still asked him to tuck the goo inside his bag.

“I’d thank you for your help, but driving me to the hospital after almost running me over is the least you could do for me,” Mark says, adjusting the bag’s strap on the unharmed shoulder as he heads to the door. “It was awful meeting you, and I hope we’ll never cross paths again. Goodbye.”

“Likewise, jackass,” Renjun responds, and then a voice that sounds a little too much like Jaemin’s echoes in his mind. _It should be in your self-interest to find a way to be better towards others, Huang Renjun. You are not a seventeen year old rebel without a cause anymore._ He follows Mark down the corridor. “Hey!”

It baffles him just how fast an injured man can walk — he catches up to Mark on the bus stop near the hospital, his body shaking in the cold as he stands there, half of his coat put on, glasses still askew on his face. He looks back at Renjun, makes a face akin to disgust, and turns his back on him again.

“Excuse me? I’m talking to you,” Renjun tells him, sitting down by his side on the bench. “Let me drive you home.”

“I don’t believe you to be someone that should be trusted with a vehicle,” Mark responds. “So, no, thank you, I’d rather take the bus.”

He stays silent for a moment, and then adds: “Since you also trashed my bike.”

“I’ll buy you another bike,” Renjun says. “Let me drive you home.”

“I’d rather not.”

“It’s the least I can do,” he insists.

Mark’s chin juts forward, his nose high up in the air, and Renjun is _irritated_ — he’s not the type to beg, especially to someone who really doesn’t deserve it, but isn’t this the point? Isn’t this why he came to this small town? To change for the better, or whatever it is that he told himself before leaving once and for good?

“Let me drive you home,” Renjun says once again, slowly. “And I swear that you’ll never hear of me again. Not that it means anything to you, but you have my word.”

“It truly doesn’t mean anything to me,” Mark replies. Still, he gets up, and waits for Renjun to show him the way.

In hindsight, Renjun should have not bribed the instructor in order to get his driver’s license.

He’s failed the test three times. Jeno had told him that third time is always the charm, but it didn’t seem to be the case — he was tired of his bandmates driving him around, and he was tired of catching the bus. Too many people staring and, anyway, what did he have money for? _Drugs, chocolate and stupid shit,_ Chenle would say. _At least it’s not stupid watches that I’ll never wear,_ Renjun would reply.

Whatever. The did is done. Renjun is currently hundreds and hundreds of miles away from what he used to call home, he’s been clean for months, he drives like shit, and he’s trying to be good. He really is. Which is why, once he hears a familiar scoff, he fights back a scowl.

“I think I told you to leave me alone,” Mark Lee tells him. It’s been a week after their first encounter, the entirety of which Renjun had spent locked in the apartment he rented from an elderly woman, either sleeping like the dead or counting the cracks in the ceiling painting until he was too tired to keep his eyes open. Mark cleans his throat. “Do you have hearing problems?”

Renjun drove him home. Renjun opened the old, rusty gate to Mark’s apartment building and walked over the floorboards that crook under his feet, he had carried Mark’s bag all the way up to the fifth floor because there was no elevator, and he even unlocked the door for him because watching as Mark tried to get the right key with only one functional hand was pitiful to say the least. Once inside, Mark had grumpily thanked him, and Renjun had said: _until never again, Mark Lee. Have a nice rest of your life._

“It’s a small town,” Renjun reasons. “How’s your shoulder?”

Mark shrugs with the good one. His shopping bag contains two bottles of wine, some chips and many pints of ice cream. Renjun’s is similar, with just the exception of many more savory snacks.

“I thought you were just driving by,” Mark says, matter-of-factly. “No one ever stays in this town.”

“Which is why you’re here?” Renjun asks him.

“Precisely.”

The empty store is proof of that — Renjun has yet to meet another soul, aside from vendors and the old lady that rented his apartment. It’s the perfect place for him. Empty, cold, away from the madness of big cities. When he was a child, Renjun used to dream of leaving the small town he was born in and making it big somewhere else — six months ago, it was comforting to know that his past self grew up to be what he had always dreamed of. Leather jackets, expensive boots, brand new guitars, cash in his pocket and lipstick stains on his neck. Now, Renjun is in old sweatpants, buying shit brands of ice cream in the middle of fucking nowhere. What could be more fitting for a soon-to-be ghost town than the ghost he’s been turning into?

“I like it here,” Renjun replies, although Mark didn’t ask and probably never would. He reaches for a cheap brand chocolate bar — there aren’t many options — and drops it inside his bag.

Mark lets out a long hum. They look quite stupid standing here, the only ones at the store aside from the cashier, and when Mark turns to take a look at other shelves, Renjun looks the opposite way to resume shopping. He stands partially hidden in an aisle as Mark pays, and only walks up to the cashier once he’s out of the store.

“That brand is quite awful,” Mark whispers to him on an occasion. They keep meeting at the store, naturally, as every dying town needs one particular spot in which everything happens — Renjun doesn’t really go to other places, also. He frowns, confused, and looks up at where Mark is watching him with big doe eyes through a gap in the shelf, and Renjun puts back the tomato sauce, blocking his view.

“Thanks,” he mutters, and moves along.

It happens again. Renjun is picking up pasta and Mark’s voice echoes through the aisle. “Bad choice,” it says. Renjun nods as he puts it down and picks another one. “That’s even worse.”

He tries again. “Too expensive and definitely not worth the price.”

Renjun looks back at the cashier over his shoulder, and once he’s sure that the old man isn’t paying attention to him, starts to frantically push the products around on the shelf until he finds Mark looking at him, his eyebrows raised. “How do you even know what I’m getting?” Renjun asks. “You can’t _see_.”

“I’ve memorized the shelves,” Mark replies. It’s, frankly, something a bit odd to say, but Mark _is_ odd. He probably doesn’t have any friends — Renjun doesn’t, either —, and has probably been living here for far too long. If Renjun were in his shoes, he thinks he’d memorize the store’s shelves, too, just for the sake of it. “You don’t cook, do you?”

In the golden days of their band, Renjun didn’t stay home enough to eat, and when he was home, he ordered out from the expensive restaurants Donghyuck introduced him to. Back in the beginning, he didn’t cook either — Jaemin did. Jaemin cooked really well, and he wanted all of them to eat well. He thinks, or at least used to, that love comes back to that. “I’m trying to learn,” he whispers. "A guy must live somehow."

Mark snorts. He puts back a can of beans in the tiny gap Renjun was watching him through, and they call it a day.

Before you ask, he was the last man standing.

Renjun had _always_ been the last man standing — he'd close the garage after practice, he'd wait until every single person had left the venue after gigs, he'd lock the studio after recording. He was the last to join the band so it was only natural that he was the last to leave, too. He saw Jeno pack his shit and go, he saw Chenle's keyboard disappear from its usual spot, he saw empty spaces where Jaemin's bass used to be, he saw Donghyuck buying the plane tickets through hushed whispers on the phone, he saw Jisung wait until the very last minute possible to have his drums moved out of the studio, ever so hopeful that they’d last through one more rough time.

When Jisung left, though, that's when Renjun knew it was over for real. That's when he knew no one was ever going to walk through that studio’s door again — what would it be of them without Jisung to set the beat? What would it be of Renjun without Jisung, in general?

Sighing, he plucks the strings of his guitar in some awkward, out of tune attempt. Renjun used to have many, many guitars — they filled an entire wall back in his place, and Jisung loved it. He has no idea what Kun did to those guitars, maybe they're still there, maybe they'll be there if he comes back, the only thing waiting for him back home.

In this apartment, though, the walls are bare — the white paint is chipped off in some places, and there are rectangular shapes in a lighter tone here and there. Posters, Renjun presumes. Posters of someone who has grown up already, and doesn't need them anymore. Were they of rock bands?, he wonders. Probably not. He puts the guitar down on the floor and lets himself fall back to the mattress, pressing the heels of his palms to his eyes and exhaling slowly.

" _Why did you come here, Renjun?"_ Mark had asked him when they met outside the store for the first time. The sun was a pale yellow ball in the sky and the wind ruffled Mark’s dark hair slightly, and Renjun wasn't planning to see him — he wasn't waiting for him to show up or anything. He might as well have grown roots in the curb.

" _I had nowhere else to go_ ," he had replied. Mark let out a long, long hum and offered him a clementine that he was peeling — Renjun accepted. “ _What about you? Why did you come here?_ ”

Mark shrugged, looking out to the distance. “ _Too many places to go, I think._ ”

He gets up. The only window in his room, which is actually a set of glass doors leading to a small balcony, has the view of a cemetery — which is morbid, which is depressing, which is why it was so cheap to rent it. Not that money is a problem, but he likes this. He likes this stupidly small apartment and the view of the cemetery. He likes the angel statues on the graves, the moss over the stones under the melting snow, and when the Sun is back for good, Renjun will drag a chair to that small balcony and sit there all day.

Not today, no. Sitting in the Sun is for later. He puts on his boots and grabs a coat, taking the stairs to the lobby — like Mark’s building, this one doesn’t have an elevator either. He’s been told that there are other people, mostly elders, living in the remaining three apartments, but he has yet to meet them. Then again, a future ghost town. Renjun _loves_ it.

The path to the cemetery is slippery, reminds him of open venues after the rain, in which he had to trust his feet not to let him slip and break his neck, but Renjun manages to get to the gate intact. Deep inside, he doesn’t know why he’s doing it — he’s never been good with death, or mourning, for that matter. He hasn’t stepped in a cemetery in years, but has grown used to the shape of the statues over the graves, and he doesn’t have anywhere else to go, anyway. The gates creak when Renjun opens them, and he stops at the entrance to take in the view.

Well, it’s not a big cemetery — it’s fairly decent, but not as big as the ones you find in big cities. He walks between a bunch of graves with hands in his pockets, inspecting epithets, before eventually sitting down at the edge of a particularly tacky grave, looking up at the blindfolded angel statue over it.

It’s good here. It’s serene, like Renjun believes death should be. He doesn't know how long he stays there, but his fingers are almost too gelid to move when he gets up.

_TRACK 2: SPRING_

"Sooner or later, you're going to have to tell me something."

Mark looks up from where he's curled up on the couch, a mug of hot chocolate in his hands and a blanket thrown over his legs. "Should I, though?"

"It's not fair, is what I'm saying," Renjun continues. “I’ve been here for months, and you barely let me in.”

Unfazed, Mark takes a sip of his drink, looking away. “You’re literally sitting on my desk as we speak. I don’t know how to let you in further than that.”

Sighing, Renjun spins around in the chair, his gaze falling upon Mark’s typewriter. Granted, he’s right, as there isn’t much to do here — Mark doesn’t even own a TV. His apartment is a nerd’s wet dream, and Renjun has given up on trying to find any secrets between his book shelves and mugs of coffee lost in between books.

He’s been here countless times already — back when Mark’s shoulder was still healing, Renjun would carry his groceries inside and stand in the middle of the room, unsure where to go, until Mark either kicked him out or offered him a coffee or a tea. He’s not the most organized person in the world, but his mess makes sense where Renjun’s doesn't — Renjun’s mess comes from the sense that he doesn’t care, and Mark’s mess comes from the sense that he cares too much. Piles of books near his bed, stacks of paper on the desk, his typewriter that never runs out of ink. It’s an old thing, that typewriter of his, the kind that is probably a family heirloom or then he’s more pretentious than Renjun had assumed; gently, Renjun’s fingers ghost over the keytop, each letter slightly bent from use.

This is the only thing in the room that truly matters, he believes. He knows more about Mark looking at this than anything else. Still, still — he looks over his shoulder, to where Mark is watching him over the rim of his mug, his eyebrow cocked in a challenge.

“Journalist,” Renjun guesses.

“Not at all.”

He sighs. “Scientist?”

Mark snorts. “Do I look like a scientist to you?”

“I don’t know what a scientist looks like,” Renjun replies. Most of his acquaintances, they were artists too — he has spent too much time among other musicians to pay attention to other people.

“Well, they surely don’t look like me.”

He rolls his eyes, tearing his hands away from the typewriter. There are old circular stains on the wooden top of the desk, either from wine or coffee, and Renjun rubs a finger over one of them as he inspects the desk. He can’t make sense of Mark’s handwriting, scattered over different papers and journals, and he has tried. “Historian?” he guesses.

“Close, but not quite.”

Looking back at him, Mark flashes him a small grin before getting up from his spot on the couch. The blanket slips off his legs and to the floor, and Renjun gets up to steal his spot quickly, scooping the blanket in his arms and wrapping it around his shoulders.

Back from the kitchen, Mark squints eyes at him as he sits on the opposite end of the couch — it’s not a big one, his feet touch Renjun’s thigh as he pulls his knees to his chest. “You take a lot of space for someone so small,” he says.

“So I’ve been told,” Renjun responds. Back when he lived with Donghyuck, at the beginning of everything and a little more, he always said that Renjun is the type of person to fill in spots naturally. It was really just a nice way to say that he’s imposing. “It’s getting warmer.”

Mark hums, turning to look at the window. The sunlight filtering through the curtains tints his skin in warm colors now that the snow has melted, and Renjun rests the side of his head against the back of the couch as he watches him. When Mark looks back at him, though, he averts his gaze. “It’s getting warmer, yes,” he taps his shoulder with a hand. “Soon you’ll have more places to visit without the risk of slipping and breaking an arm, right? Imagine that!”

Biting back a laugh, Renjun nods.

When his birthday comes around, Renjun buys a cake for himself.

He didn’t do these things when he was younger. Granted, he was never home enough for his parents to bother baking a cake, and even if he was, he doubts they would — every year during school, Jaemin would bring him a muffin and light it up during break. Sometimes he’d even bring an actual slice of cake, made by his grandmother who Renjun adored. _Happy birthday, Huang Renjun,_ he’d whisper against the side of his head as he wrapped him in a tight hug. _May your conquest of the world be smooth as silk._

He buys a cake. It’s small and chocolate flavored, it doesn’t have any special topping in it, and Renjun lights up a candle for himself in the darkness of his room. He didn’t call Mark because they had an argument recently — Renjun thinks it was meant to happen. Just because all the flowers are blooming, doesn’t mean that either of them has lost their past thorns. They’ll come around eventually.

Anyways — March, 23. Yet another one. When they were younger, he and Jeno used to joke about turning twenty three on the 23rd. That idea had always seemed so far away, so distant from his reality, yet here he is. Not seventeen anymore. Twenty three. He leans in and blows the candle.

Jisung calls again.

This time, he tells Renjun about planning out a trip with Chenle during summertime — he’s able to hear Chenle’s voice in the background, high and lively like it always was, he’s complaining about Jisung having eaten the last of his snacks. Nothing unlike the usual, in Renjun’s memory. He stays there, back pressed to the glass window and looking out into the street as Jisung says he’s thinking of learning how to surf, and it’s only when the street vendors start to pack their things for the night that he clears his throat.

“Jisung,” the latter hums. “The others?”

He stays silent for a long while, long enough for Renjun to check whether the call has ended without him noticing or not. But it’s Jisung he’s talking with, and Jisung has never been the type to leave anything unsaid, so he replies: “Jeno’s back to college.”

“That’s good for him.”

“Yeah,” Jisung sighs. “I heard Donghyuck signed up with a new label. Actually, Jaemin told Chenle. They had coffee together one of these days.”

“And how are you holding up?”

Once again, Jisung stays silent for a while. Renjun has to fish coins from his pocket before he replies. “I think I’ll try and audition for a new band.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I don’t know, though,” he hums. “You— you told me not to let myself go to waste, didn’t you?”

“I did.”

“Yeah.”

“Jisung,” Renjun says. “I’m happy for you. I really am.”

He knows the others are, too, wherever they are. Jisung’s always been too good of a drummer to do anything else — the time he was theirs was the greatest. Now he’s off to bigger, brighter things. Renjun hears as he lets out a shaky sigh and gives him time, but lets out a gasp himself when someone knocks on the glass window behind him.

“I have to go. I’ll call to know about your new project.”

“Okay,” Jisung replies. “Take care, Renjun.”

He puts the phone back in its place and smiles at it, unconsciously. Talking to Jisung has always been like a breath of fresh air, so it isn’t anything different from what he’s used to — or what he used to be used to —, but something about all of them moving forward makes him feel funny . He tucks the telephone in its place and turns around, watching as Mark Lee makes a fool of himself, drawing on the glass with the tip of his finger and blowing hot air over it. Like Renjun was sure he would, he came around. They’re the only people in this town that are not seventy years old, they have to stick to each other somehow. He reaches to open the door. “A dick, really? I feel so flattered.”

“My pleasure,” Mark says. He holds the door open for him and does a silly flourish. Renjun bats his hand away. “My, aren’t we in a mood today.”

Renjun doesn’t respond. He tugs his jacket tighter around himself while Mark shuts the telephone box closed. It’s a bit sunny, but not enough for him to feel warm — it rained the whole night, the cobblestones in the streets humid still.

“Who was that, your girlfriend?” Mark asks. He shakes his head negatively. “Boyfriend?”

“I don’t have any of those.”

“Friend? You do have at least one of those, don’t you?”

Rolling his eyes, Renjun nods. They start walking, and it isn’t until they’ve reached a cafe that Mark particularly likes that he mutters: “I had a band.”

“What?”

“I had a band,” Renjun repeats, louder. “We broke up.”

“That’s a bummer,” Mark hums. He kicks a pebble, watching as it startles a bunch of doves in the curb, and then turns to him with eyebrows raised. “Were you any good?”

He thinks about it. Grammy statues on the shelf, his face in about a billion magazines, sold out venues around the world where he’ll never set foot again, six years and counting — yes, they were good, and even if they weren’t, it was enough for him. It was more than enough for him. “Not at all,” he lies. “But I liked it.”

“Why the long face, then?”

He shrugs. “It was all I had. It’s weird that they’re not around most of the time.”

The words feel heavy on his tongue, for some reason. Renjun doesn’t think he had ever mentioned any of his former bandmates to Mark, in all the months he’s been here — he doubts he has said their names out loud, even to himself. Renjun has always been an adept of the idea that things stop existing if you don’t think about them too much; that’s how he managed to go through most of his life. Don’t think about your father, don’t think about school, don’t think about that contract that didn’t end up well, don’t think about that ex boyfriend. Don’t think about Donghyuck’s shirts in his closet or his rings, lost in between the cushions of Renjun’s couch. Don’t think about Jeno’s voice in the morning right before rehearsal or the familiar sight of his car, waiting for him on the curb. Don’t think about Jaemin’s reassuring smile or him cooking for a party of six like he was cooking for the queen. Don’t think about Chenle’s fingers over a keyboard like magnets or his chin tucked to the curve of Renjun’s shoulder familiarly. Don’t think about Jisung’s drumsticks lost in his bag or his hands, ever so used to carrying him when he needed. Don’t think about it, just don’t. Maybe those things will stop existing one day.

The point is — does Renjun want them to stop existing? For a long while, he thought he did. If he could, he’d wipe those memories from his mind and start from scratch, not keen on being hurt by his own foolish, stupidly hopeful brain. But thinking about it now doesn’t make him sad, or angry for that matter. Thinking about it now is almost nice.

“Well,” Mark says after what feels like a lifetime. They cross the street in quick steps and he stops right in front of an old bookstore, the only one in town — Renjun had been there. He bought a book for Donghyuck, something science fiction, he didn’t even read the back cover properly, just knows he’ll like it. “Your whole life can’t revolve around a single thing, anyway. You were someone before them, and you always will be someone after them. The meaning of oneself isn’t tied to the people around them, because those come and go. What matters is what remains.”

“Now those are big words coming from you,” Renjun teases. Mark sighs audibly, but Renjun knows it’s true. There was happiness because of them, and there will be happiness after them. Both these things can be true, anyway.

_TRACK 3: SUMMER_

Mark’s back is dotted with freckles, shining golden under the sunlight, and Renjun has to hold on tighter to the boat’s oars in order not to reach out for him, which surprises himself.

It’s summer, anyway. It’s summer and he’s wearing shorts, sitting in a precarious boat that he’d usually be caught dead before entering, and Mark Lee sits with his back turned to him as he tells Renjun some silly, mundane story he hasn’t been paying attention to, but knows that it’s a good one. Mark has a way with words that Renjun envies, or rather understands too much to be comfortable with — when he speaks, even the trees listen.

In retrospect, it should have been obvious from the start. _“Writer,”_ Renjun had accused him. Mark threw his head back in laughter, wine spilling from his glass. _“You’re a goddamn writer.”_

He’s a goddamn writer. Now that Renjun knows, he can’t unsee it. Now that Renjun knows, he feels awfully close to him, which is both relieving and terrifying — instead of dwelling in his thoughts, he tries to focus on the reckless splattered over Mark’s shoulders.

“Are we close?” he asks, out of a sudden. Mark looks back at him with his lips pressed into a fine line, and then nods. It’s a big lake, and Renjun has never been on a boat before, but Mark had promised him good food and a sight worth of William Wordsworth’s words, whatever the fuck that means. He says gibberish and Renjun eats it up without knowing, much to his horror.

“Just a few more minutes. Are you enjoying yourself?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Well, I am,” Mark responds. Renjun snorts, and he even lets out a chuckle, extending a hand over the edge of the boat to touch the water beneath them. “I should boss you around more often.”

“All that you’ve done since I arrived here is boss me around.”

“And I shall do it for even longer, I think.”

“Right,” he rolls his eyes. Mark full-on laughs now, arms curling around his stomach as he leans forward, and Renjun wonders just how many kilometers of golden skin did God waste before he found the perfect tone for him. He quickly pushes that thought to the back of his mind.

Mark’s secret hiding place is something else. It’s too sunny and Renjun is sweating inside his shirt, the first few buttons loose ever since he left the apartment, but Mark sits down by the shade of a willow tree and pats the space beside him. When Renjun sits down and looks ahead, to the enormous lake and their little town at the distance and all the wildflowers in the grass, he gets it.

“This is where all the poets come to die,” Mark tells him. “Not literally, of course. But I like to believe that, if there’s anywhere in the world where someone’s words are put to rest, it’s here.”

In a spur of courage, Renjun asks him; “Is this why you’ve come here to hide?”

Mark stays silent for a long while, fidgeting with the bottle of wine until he reaches for a corkscrew in his bag. “Maybe so,” he replies. “Isn’t it worth it?”

He bets that it is. Renjun grabs the glasses and watches as Mark pours the crimson liquid.

Their shoulders press together as they drink, words falling from Renjun’s mouth easier than they’ve ever done before. He tells him of recording booths and tacky outfits, of vinyls with their faces on it, of Paris and Santiago. While Mark knew about the band, he didn’t _know_ about the band — he listens closely as Renjun tells him stories about Jaemin’s convertible that he never let him drive. Donghyuck’s rings on a chain around his neck so he wouldn’t lose them anymore and poetry books shoved in the back pockets of his pants. Always being roommates with Chenle during tours and sneaking out of hotel rooms to meet fans in the middle of the night. Jeno glueing the pages of his old leather journal together, ignoring each and every attempt of theirs to buy him a new one. Jisung’s singing voice as he hummed along to Renjun’s lyrics. He tells him all of it, so much that the wine is gone, and Renjun presses a hand against his face as he mutters an apology.

“Don’t apologize for that,” Mark responds, nudging him on the side. His cheeks are slightly flushed pink, but it could either be the wine or just the sun — he doesn’t look drunk, and Renjun doesn’t feel like that either. “I like it. I like hearing you talk. You shouldn’t feel sorry for it.”

“That’s news for me,” Renjun teases. “Remember when you’d go around telling me to stop stalking you?”

Mark complains under his breath about him really looking like a stalker back in winter before taking one last sip of his wine, resting the glass on the grass beside him. He’s still shirtless, button up wrapped around his waist, and in a spur of courage, Renjun reaches out to touch his forearm briefly before retrieving his hand.

“What was that for?” Mark asks him, for he’s never just too shy to say anything.

“Nothing,” Renjun responds. “Not everything has to have a purpose.”

Humming, Mark leans into his side. It’s just a little bit, the warmth of his skin seeping through Renjun’s shirt like homemade caramel. “Touché,” he whispers, and when Mark’s lips brush against his jaw, he doesn’t waste time before chasing his mouth.

_TRACK 4: FALL_

“Did you write a lot of love songs?”

Renjun snorts, craning his neck to watch Mark tentatively plucking the strings of his guitar. He’s not entirely horrible at it — maybe Renjun could really teach him.

“Why?” he asks. “Do you want one?”

“Why,” Mark retorts. “Will you write one for me when you leave?”

Two weeks before, he got a letter from Kun. Renjun’s grace period is over — either he comes back home or says goodbye for good. “Maybe,” he rolls on his back, staring at the ceiling. The mattress dips where Mark sets a knee on it, the guitar long forgotten by the side of the bed, and Renjun watches as he crawls up to him. “Will you write a book for me when you leave?”

“A hit song and a bestseller are very different things,” he responds.

“I didn’t ask for a bestseller, I only asked for a book.”

Mark’s bottom lip juts out. “Therefore no hit song for me, I suppose.”

Humming, Renjun sits up and presses his thumb to Mark’s bottom lip, pink and bruised. Then, he cups his face with a hand and leans in. A thousand years ago, Jeno used to tell him that not everything he touches will be his, but when has that ever stopped Renjun before? Perhaps he wants Mark to be his, even if it’s just until the last orange leaf falls to the ground, even if it’s just for the weekend. ‘Tis the damn season, isn’t it? He might as well make use of it.

“I’m leaving,” Mark tells him, his mouth hot and still a bit unfamiliar. “Tomorrow. You should know.”

“I know, me too,” Renjun responds. One of his hands finds the way to the back of Mark’s neck, fingers digging into his hair. “Your point being?”

Mark’s eyes flutter closed, his nose brushing against Renjun’s. “None at all. Not everything has to have a meaning, or— or something,” he mutters. Renjun has a tease at the tip of his tongue — when has Mark Lee ever done something without a purpose, or when has he ever been speechless? He has never lost his words before, not in the way Renjun has. “Jesus. You put my head in such a flurry. I’m never going to see you again.”

Renjun would thank him for the compliment, but Mark’s fingers feel so good around his waist. He presses himself closer, closer than they’ll ever be again, and lets Mark kiss him stupid, like no one has ever kissed him before. He’ll be thinking about this for ages to come. And Mark had warned him, around the time they met, he didn’t say a word but Renjun heard it loud and clear: he’s never going to find anyone like him. _What makes you so special?_ , Renjun wants to ask him. _What makes you so special that the seasons lose their meaning?_ But words aren’t needed, not right now, not ever.

_OUTRO: SOLSTICE_

“Hey,” Donghyuck mutters, nudging him on the ribs. “I think you’d like this, come take a look.”

“I can’t, I’m busy,” Renjun responds, flipping through a magazine with disinterest. He’s missed pushing at Donghyuck’s buttons, that’s all. He didn’t expect to see him again so soon, but that was a foolish assumption of him, anyway — it’s Donghyuck, actually, it’s all of them, and Renjun would come back running every time if they just said the word, to be here holding Donghyuck’s shopping bags and buying his snacks despite the constant banter.

Donghyuck sighs audibly — his hair, now blonde, stands out in the crowded bookshop. He pinches him on the arm, causing Renjun to look up at him with a scow. “What was that for, asshole?”

Wordlessly, Donghyuck picks up a book from the shelf and shoves it against his chest before taking one for himself as well. “From award-winning author Mark Lee—” he recites, and Renjun’s magazine falls to the floor as he holds onto the book. “I haven’t seen something from him in so long, though. I read somewhere that last year’s Nobel had taken a toll on him. Talk about writer’s block, right? Well, I think you’d like it, even though you’re not that much of a reader yourself.”

Renjun lets out a hum, tapping the cover with a finger before turning it around in his hands, looking at Mark’s picture on the back cover. “Thanks for the recommendation, I’ll buy it,” he says, to which Donghyuck smiles happily. Renjun tucks the book under his arm as they head to the cashier.


End file.
